White Lace and Promises (11 page)

But this label had held particular disgust.

Asahel Prosperity Sexton had never kept a mistress and had sneered down his narrow nose at men who needed to crawl under a woman’s skirts to seek sexual heights. Putting another positive profit into the ledgers had seemed to be the only satisfaction the senior Sexton had ever needed.

If Grey had to guess, he would say his father had been relieved that Grey’s mother had proved too frail to risk childbed a second time and had kept to her chambers. For years, he had ignored her until that day he could not publicly ignore her. He’d had to leave his warehouses and counting rooms for form’s sake.

It seemed the coldest day in the history of the world. An early spring day. Whipping wind bit through Grey’s new, itchy black wool suit. His father walked ahead of him, pulling on his hand. His father strode swiftly, keeping his face forward, his tall, broad-shouldered back held straight as a frigate’s mast. He didn’t turn. Not even once, the whole way from the carriage. He didn’t notice how Grey struggled to keep up on his far shorter six-year-old legs. Stumbling along the rain soaked graveyard, Grey tripped and fell face down in the mud. His father’s hand grasped his collar and hauled him to his feet. A cloth roughly wiped the muck from his face. The taste of blood filled his mouth as he stared up into icy grey eyes, devoid of any emotion save for impatience and exasperation.

The sharp sound of the dog barking below the window pulled Grey back into the present moment. He blinked several times, readjusting to the benign warmth of the dressing room.

He shivered. Christ, how many years since he’d even allowed himself to think of
that
day? Shaken, he took another long sip from his glass. Yes, it was before noon, and yes, he was drinking brandy. By God, he’d needed something to steady his nerves after last night. The dreaming, imaginative boy had got himself in too deeply now. Beguiled by the sad-eyed girl with hair like shimmering moonlight.

The burn of the alcohol in his stomach did little to steady him. He sat the glass down and shook his head. He did not need distraction now. He could not risk it. His political contacts had told him that Congress was poised to declare war. All else was a mere formality.

Beth would soon be living in his house. Sleeping in his bed. How was he to hold up under night after night like the last? Again, he remembered his parents keeping their separate chambers and always so stiffly polite. He had pictured a happy marriage as something close to that but with warmer relations.

He had not pictured two people consumed by fire each time they came within sight of each other. He did not know how he was going to handle things. But one thing was certain, the business must always come first no matter the dictates of his heart. He must put logic above feeling always, or everything would be lost. Too many people depended on him. He didn’t have the luxury to wallow in passion much longer.

But he would give Beth today.

* * * *

Beth opened her eyes. Grey’s pillow still bore the imprint of his head. She touched the hollow but it was cool.

Sleep still blurred her mind. She never slept this late. Never. She took several deep breaths, willing her sleep-fuzzed mind to clear. She glanced around the chamber. A thin line of light showed under the door that connected this bedchamber to the little dressing chamber next to it. She arose from the bed, padded to the door and opened it.

Sunlight streamed in the open windows and assaulted her eyes. She blinked.

“Good morning, Beth.”

She turned and focused on Grey, dressed in a black banyan, with his hair still damp and his face clean-shaven. He crushed out his cigar and the acrid scent of tobacco smoke grew stronger. He stood and walked to a tall, mahogany dresser and opened a drawer. He came to her, holding a folded garment.

“This is for you.”

She took the cool, pale blue satin and unfolded it. It was a wrapper, with no lace or trim to spoil its simple elegance. Her fingers glided over the cool, silken fabric.

“If you’d rather have something else—a different colour or style—I shall get it for you.” His eyes were tender, with no trace of the possessive stranger who had savagely driven her to the heights hours before.

“Oh, no, it’s lovely.” She slipped it over her nakedness and tied the belt. She looked up and found his eyes on her, warm with appreciation. He reached out his arms and she went to stand in front of him. “Grey…”

He grasped her by the hips, pulled her closer. His eyes, dark and passionate, captivated hers. His lovemaking held an opiate-like quality for her—the more she had, the more she craved.

“Let’s go back to the bed,” he said.

She shook her head, as much for herself as for him. “No, we need to discuss something. Something serious.”

Almost instantly a front-parlour expression fell over his face and regret at the loss of intimacy pricked her heart. From the table by the chair, he picked up a glass with brandy in it and motioned to his recently vacated chair. “Have a seat, then, and tell me what’s on your mind.”

Heaviness settled into her belly as she sat. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to discuss this, but they had to—though she couldn’t look at him, coward that she was. She studied her sapphire ring. “Someone told me you turned your first wife out of your house.”

Silence.

She glanced up. He was leaning against the doorframe, staring into his drink as he swirled it.

“It’s not true, correct?” she asked, her heart hammering.

Please, oh please let him give the right answer.

“If you can believe I’d do something like that—good God, Beth, what were you doing here with me last night? What are you doing here with me now?”

“I don’t know what to believe. I wish you’d tell me.”

 
Outside the window, a carriage clattered by and that bad-mannered mutt began barking again in the silence. Her nerves stretched like violin strings. “Won’t you tell me?”

He sighed. “The whole business with Juliana was…complicated.”

“Complicated?” A dull ache settled between her eyes. “How?”

“I have no wish to discuss this. Not this morning.”

“But I want to. I need to know your past.”

He glanced up and his sharp, silver stare cut into her. “Beth, you have quite a past yourself.”

His hard tone hit her with brutal force, almost like a blow knocking the wind out of her. She gasped. But what else could she say? “Yes, I have.”

“And you asked me specifically not to interrogate you over it, remember?”

Aware of the change in focus, the change in her role from accuser to accused, she nodded, slowly, almost afraid to move lest she bring even more unwelcome attention onto herself .

“And, since then, I haven’t trespassed where I am not welcome to pry, have I?”

Under his steady gaze, she pulled her legs up and curled them under herself.

“Have I?” he repeated, more firmly.

“No,” she said, her voice small.

“Well, then, kindly repay the courtesy.” His knuckles went white as he held the glass and raised it to his lips. Then he downed the contents in one swallow.

Shame burnt through her to have brought the matter up, to have pried into his past, and yet… And yet his logic seemed slightly off. Yes, her past included men—but they were unimportant men. Faithless Joshua and a handful of men with whom she’d lain once and who didn’t matter now. She’d owed them nothing. But they were discussing his first wife and a wife was…well, a
wife
.

“I never laid with a married man,” she blurted.

The skin stretched over his cheekbones. “We agreed not to speak of it, remember?”

“But I want you to know. I must say this.”

“All right, Beth, what must you say?”

“I think marriage is a sacrament. No matter how bad things become, one shouldn’t ever desert one’s spouse.”

“A fine sentiment. But that’s all it is.”

The smug certainty in his voice made her seethe and her spine went rigid. “Is it?”

“Yes, and the very sentiment of it shows how little you know of life or marriage.”

* * * *

 
Beth pretended to sip her tea but the cold, hard mass lodged in the pit of her stomach wouldn’t allow her to take on much of the fragrant brew. Across from her, Grey wore that front-parlour expression, his voice kind as he asked her what she wanted him to order for her. Even though they’d already been here a few times, to Gray’s Ferry, located near the Schuylkill, Beth still felt like a fraud. Goodness—proper and polite table talk with Grey. She always grew self-conscious, a shy, shrinking creature unable to do more than nod and smile.

She felt so stupid and insipid. This was no bedchamber, where she could seduce and pleasure and satisfy. This was the real world, where one was expected to be witty and intellectually interesting. How could she possibly be intellectually interesting? Her studies had bored her to insanity. He’d graduated from Harvard with honours. She’d been nowhere and done nothing. He’d been all over the world as a young man, as a supercargo on his father’s ships.

Her quietness in these public and more formal settings never seemed to bother or bore him. He filled the silence with tales from Russia, India, England, France and the Caribbean. But today he seemed as reluctant to speak as she. The discord from that morning hung between them. She picked at her food, trying not to take too many glances at him. She wanted to ask him about the duel, but his distant expression and jutting, stiffly held jaw discouraged her.

What the devil was on his mind?

“I am going home for a few weeks.”

His words fell over her like cold rain. Her mouth dropped open and she jerked her head up to meet his silver gaze. “But we’re getting married in a few weeks.”

An iciness gripped her heart and held it firm, squeezing. He was returning to New York. In a week or two, maybe longer, there would come a letter—a letter explaining that he was crying off, because he’d discovered how dull and unsophisticated she really was. He knew she’d never fit into his life. The hand that held her fork began to shake slightly.

“Beth.” He spoke sharply.

She flinched and dropped her fork. It landed on her plate with a clatter. “What?”

“Are you unwell?”

“I am fine.” Acid lurched up into her throat. She swallowed it back. Oh God, don’t let her make a scene over this. Please.

“You’ve gone so suddenly pale.”

“I am fine.” She stiffened her spine and squared her shoulders to manage some dignity. She tried to smile but her trembling lips wouldn’t stretch.

He drew his black brows together and his forehead wrinkled. “Beth, have some faith in me. I shall return for our wedding.”

“Take me with you.”

The words slipped out before she could stop them. She cringed. What a weak, pathetic thing to say. Love was turning her into a shrinking ninny. She picked up her teacup, tossed her head and tried to act as if she really didn’t care what his response was.

But it didn’t work.

The smile froze on his thin, well-shaped lips and he looked stunned, as if her coming with him hadn’t occurred to him. He opened his mouth but hesitated, in the way of a person who struggles for the softest way to say a hard truth.

She stared down at the teacup in her hands. “Of course you can’t.”

“For the sake of your reputation, Beth, I dare not.”

“Of course,” she repeated. Oh, but she didn’t believe his reason for a moment. The truth was that he didn’t wish to be troubled with her. She sensed it in her bones.

“I shall miss you, Beth, you know I shall.”

The careful, gentle note in his voice made her throat burn. It was the tone of a man who wants only to be gone and doesn’t wish to deal with a tedious emotional scene. She nodded.

He smiled, his relief evident in the way the skin relaxed over his cheekbones. “We shall be wed soon enough. And then we shall live together all of the time.”

His words should have soothed her. They didn’t.

* * * *

“Sexton! Hold up.” The male voice came from behind them as they made their way up Main Street.

Grey tightened his hand on hers as he stopped and turned around to face the man who had spoken. Beth followed and hung behind his large frame. She’d had enough meetings and curious eyes for the week—maybe the whole month. “Have you heard my good news?” Beth could hear the grin in Grey’s voice and it warmed her. He couldn’t fake a smile to save his soul.

Maybe he
was
still
happy about marrying her.

“What good news?” The man said.

“I am engaged to be married.” Grey turned, put his hand to her waist and pulled her in front of his body.

A tall, lean, tawny-haired gentleman, his face so hard-boned he seemed petrified, stared back at her with amber eyes. Shocked amber eyes.

Her heart battered wildly against her ribcage and cold sweat broke out over her body.

Oh God, oh God, oh God.

Mr Thomas Watson, one of New York’s most up-and-coming merchants. Here. In the days before Grey, she’d counted Watson as one of her finest sexual conquests.